Kenneth Rooks also had a "must-see" moment before becoming a silver medalist in Paris on Wednesday.
In July 2023 while competing for BYU, Rooks fell during the 3,000-meter steeplechase at the USATF outdoor championships in Eugene, Oregon. He got back up and won the race — finishing with a career-best time of 8:16.78.
"It was life-altering," Rooks told Doug Robinson of the Deseret News . "After the race I realized it meant something bigger. I knew how difficult it was to fall and win, especially at that level. It was not only cool, but I realized this was going to mean something. As I took my victory lap, people were thanking me for the lesson. They could learn from my race."
In August 2023, Rooks joined the Church News Podcast to talk about overcoming adversity — and finishing.
"I think the lesson that I learned is that it's really important to just choose to keep going," he said. "And I would definitely not be talking to you right now if I decided to just throw in the towel at that point. But I was able to accomplish a lot more than I thought that I would be able to, just because I decided to get up and keep going. And I made other decisions later on in the race to dig deep and to just move my way up and win, but it just all kind of started when I made that decision to get up and keep going."
